Diploma a story of generations

John Graham Jr. graduated from Assumption College Saturday with a Bachelor of Science degree in criminal justice, and you have to wonder if for one second his thoughts flashed back to another spring, 19 years ago.

That was the spring his younger brother, Jamal Graham, then only 18 years old, was shot and killed during a shoot-out with a 24-year-old assailant who was later charged with murder and sentenced to life without parole.

At the time, John was 23 and still trying to figure out his life. After graduating from Doherty Memorial High School, he enrolled at Quinsigamond Community College for a year, and then transferred to Worcester State for two years. He dropped out about the time his brother was killed.

It took him years to come to terms with his brother’s death. He couldn’t understand why Jamal got mixed up with the “wrong crowd,” and he beat himself up for not “seeing it coming” as the older sibling.

But he also wondered why his brother chose the lifestyle that aided in his death, when their father, John Graham Sr., a hard worker who at the time had his own drywall and painting company, provided well for his children.

His dad, in a discussion with a reporter shortly after Jamal’s death, must have raised some eyebrows when he told the reporter his son “was not any better or any worse than any other inner-city kids.”

But the grieving father wasn’t overlooking the waywardness of his murdered son. He was speaking of his child’s wasted potential and to the contradictions often embedded in families, and particularly those from the inner city.

John Graham Jr. grew up in the same home, with the same supportive parents and extended family. He graduated from high school, while Jamal dropped out in the 10th grade. While John was unable to find the focus to remain enrolled at Worcester State, he kept himself gainfully employed, while Jamal could not find work.

Now 42 and a 13-year veteran officer at the Worcester County House of Correction, John is married with three children. In 2010, he enrolled in Assumption’s continuing education program, because he wanted more options in how his career evolved.

“As a child I used to watch my dad work six days a week without complaint,” he said of the main influence in his life. “He worked hard for what he had. He was driven. He always said that if you want something, just don’t talk about it. You have to go get it.”

On Saturday, he graduated with a 3.6 GPA, and was honored with an Alpha Sigma Lambda distinction, a special recognition for adults “who accomplish academic excellence while facing competing interests of home and work.”

He was cheered by several family members, including his brother Mario, a Navy veteran who is currently working at General Dynamics in Connecticut; his brother Andre, a graduate of Radford University in Virginia and a Division 1 basketball player who played in Germany, and his sister, Conishia, a 19-year-old college student.

But one of biggest cheers will probably come from his biggest fan, his grandmother Beverly Spring, a longtime Worcester resident and retired municipal worker.

Ms. Spring’s love of her six children, one of whom is a Worcester firefighter and another of whom recently retired from his supervisory position at UMass Memorial Medical Center, is unquestioned. But she has an especially soft spot for her grandchildren, perhaps because she understands the vulnerability of this family generation.

In her time she has lost two grandsons, including Jamal, to gun violence. The other, Nathan Watkins, was shot at his home, right in front of his own mother, in 2004. He was 22 years old.

“John is a determined young man who has become a great husband and father, and I am so proud of him,” she said.